But perhaps the picture was a little on the black side. A Parisian of the eighteenth century would have been more indulgent towards these bathing enthusiasts and the simplicity of their attire. Witness the tale of Duclos, swimming one day near the Pont-Neuf and retrieving the bonnet of an unknown lady, which a gust had blown into the water. Restoring it to her in naturalibus, 'Excuse me, Madame/ he said, 'for having no gloves/
CHAPTER XV. MARRIAGE
Short-term marriage —A melancholy divorce-Decadal weddings — The Church reassumes its rights - Spouses unknown to each other — Napoleon and the family — Marrying Prefects -Personal Columns - A matrimonial agency
AFTER the Revolutionary experiment a slump of a pecu-ZJk liar kind made itself felt throughout society — a slump A ^in marriage. It seems to have been due to two causes, the social upheaval and, to no lesser degree, the law concerning divorce. By authorizing it in its most expeditious form, divorce by mutual consent, the deputies of 1792 intended to declare their respect for individual liberty; but perhaps they could not have foreseen that, in the case of many marriages, the system of the open door would greatly increase the number of draughts.
The Frenchmen and Frenchwomen of the Directory took it upon themselves to prove this. Turning conjugal duty into a short-term obligation, they ceased to treat seriously a link that could be fastened and unfastened with such ease, and the lives of many couples consisted simply of a series of honeymoons, shining every time in a different sky.
For those with a taste for fresh pleasures these rapid exchanges must have had their advantages, but legal union under this guise was hardly distinguishable from free love, nor passion from a passing fancy, and serious people must have asked themselves what, in this adventure, or rather these adventures, was to become of the love of horned-respect for one's name, the education of children and other outworn ideas, still worthy of respect after all, in which the France of yesterday had believed.
Long before Brumaire there had been protests in the Council of the Five Hundred against the abuse of divorce. 'What could be more immoral*, exclaimed Regnaut de FOrme, 'than to allow a man to change his wife like a coat, and a woman to change her husband like a hat? Is this not an assault on the dignity of marriage? Does it not turn it into a succession of concubinages?*
And a few days later, at the Council of the Elders, Philippe Delville had spoken to the same purpose. £ We must put an end to this traffic in human flesh that the abuse of divorce has introduced into society.'
Alas, the traffic in human flesh was destined to last longer than either of these Assemblies. Long after the end of the regime, short-term marriages persisted and divorces remained as frequent. More often than not the rupture was accomplished without pain, because it was desired by both parties. Sometimes, however, when some affection was still alive in the heart of husband or wife, the separation became more distressing, as with the Talmas, when after eleven years of wedded life the tragedian decided to leave his delightful Julie Carreau. She adored him, as everybody knew, and it is easy to imagine how she suffered when she allowed herself to be driven to the Divorce Office, once she was convinced that she had lost the game.
Few pages can be more touching than her account of the last actions of the two spouses, soon to be two strangers.
'We went to the town hall in the same carriage/ wrote Julie to one of her intimate friends. ' We talked the whole way about indifferent things, like people going into the country. My husband helped me out of the carriage; we seated ourselves beside each other, and we signed our names as if it were some ordinary contract we were entering into. Before we separated, he went with me as far as my carriage." I hope/' I said to him, "you will not deprive me altogether of your company, it would be too cruel.... You will come and see me sometimes won't, you?" "Certainly/' he said, with an air of embarrassment, "always with great pleasure." I was pale, my voice shook in spite of all my efforts to control myself. At last I reached home and was able to give myself up entirely to my grief. Pity me, for I am very unhappy/
While many divorces were thus surrounded by melancholy, matrimonial ceremonies, on the contrary, assumed an operet-tish aspect, much in harmony with the psychology of some of the partners.
They had to be celebrated in the decadal temples - in the churches, that is to say, that had been turned into public Assembly Halls, with an altar to the Fatherland, symbolic decorations and so forth. Magistrates read passages from the law to the bride and bridegroom, and delivered an address, while an orchestra played suitable music.
As marriages were usually dispatched in batches, the procession of couples often presented a rather ridiculous sight, which the onlookers were not slow to make fun of. Woe to the couples showing too great a difference in age! The wags showered jokes on them worthy of the scurrilous works of Vade, and the orchestra, joining in, chose items from its repertory to underline the comicality of the situation.
Was a Negro marrying a White? He was treated to the aria from Azemai
Ivory with ebony makes pretty jewels ...
Did an old lady appear on the arm of a twenty-five-year-old groom? They were given the refrain from the Prisonnier:
Old wife, young husband, Will never agree ...
And the crowd would take up the chorus, enjoying themselves as they would at the theatre.
People living in the Faubourg Saint-Germain today and attending the church of Saint-Thomas d'Aquin will no doubt have some difficulty in believing that masquerades such as these were taking place in their parish church in the year VIII. There is, however, a detailed account in the report of an official of the Directory who had just attended the Negro's wedding, and thought it his duty to describe the incident to his chief, the Minister of Interior.
'Citizen Minister,
C I denounce the public to you: it behaved yesterday with the utmost indecency.
'At the Temple de la Paix, 1 in the Xth arrondissement, during the marriage celebrations, there was such a hubbub going on that no reading or speech addressed to the congregation was any use. The orchestra in particular added "Saint-Thomas d'Aquin.
to the disorder by choosing tunes intended to provoke laughter/
Here followed the two instances refered to above, and in conclusion,
'This abuse, Citizen Minister, if it is not stopped, might well reduce the number of marriages. At any rate, some young women affirmed in my presence that they would rather remain single all their lives than provide amusement for the public in this way, at the risk of being hooted at.'
Thanks to the policy of religious tolerance initiated by the Consulate, weddings soon reassumed a more decent form. People were given leave to celebrate them on any day of the week, thus avoiding the publicity of collective ceremonies.
The decadal cult tried in vain to preserve its matrimonial monopoly. The festival of the Bom Menages, which it organized in the year IX, in the Temple de la Victoire, was not very successful; it served chiefly to demonstrate the spaciousness of the church of Saint-Sulpice and the insufficiency of happy couples to fill it. On the other hand, the Catholic priests, who had enjoyed relative freedom since the start of conversations with Rome, were beginning to bless a number of unions on the quiet.
To avoid offending public opinion these religious weddings took place at first without any show, and very early in the morning. The engaged couple arrived at the church towards seven or eight o'clock, and went on to the town hall afterwards. When the reverse order was prescribed after the signing of the Concordat, the church service was postponed to the end of the morning in the case of many weddings in the Faubourg Saint-Germain, while the official world mostly adopted the fashion for nocturnal ceremonies.